"Go to your tutor, my dear," she continued, "and talk Latin and Greek and such like, as you knows about; but don't talk rubbish about pretty looks and ways for a woman as is tied to a drunkard, for I can't abear it. I seed enough of husbands and public-houses in my young days to keep me a single woman and my own missis. Not but what I've had my feelings like other folk, and plenty of offers, besides a young cabinet-maker as had high wages and the beautifullest complexion you ever saw. But he was overfond of company; so I went to service, and cried myself to sleep every night for three months; and when next I see him he was staggering along the street, and I says, 'I'm sorry to see you like this, William,' and he says, 'It's your doing, Mary; your No's drove me to the glass.' And I says, 'Then it's best as it is. If one No drove you to the glass, you and married life wouldn't suit, for there's plenty of Noes there.' So I left him wiping his eyes, for he always cried when he was in beer. And I says to myself, 'I'll go back to place, where I knows what I'm working for, and can leave it if we don't suit.' And it was always the same, my dear. If it was a nice-looking footman, he'd have his evening out and come home fresh; and if it was an elderly butler as had put a little by, he wanted to set up in the public line. So I kept myself to myself, my dear, for I'm short-tempered at the best, and could never put up with the abuse of a man in liquor." I was so thoroughly converted to the side of Ragged Robin's wife, that I at once pressed some of my charity money on Mrs. Bundle for her benefit; but I tried to dispute my nurse's unfavourable view of husbands by instancing her worthy brother-in-law at Oakford. "Ah, yes, Buckle," said Mrs. Bundle, in a tone which seemed to do less justice to the saddler's good qualities than they deserved. "He's a good, soft, easy body, is Buckle." Whence I concluded that Mrs. Bundle, like some other ladies, was not altogether easy to please. I think it was during our last walk through the village before Mr. Clerke left us, that he and I called on Ragged Robin's wife. She was thankful, but not communicative, and the eyes, deep set in her bony and discoloured face, seemed to have lost the power of lighting up with hope.